1. Field
Example embodiments of the present invention generally relate to an image forming apparatus and/or an image forming method with an improved cleaning mechanism, such as one for removing contaminants including residual toner particles for example.
2. Description of the Background Art
A background electrophotographic image forming apparatus, such as a copying machine, a printer, or a facsimile machine, generally forms an electrostatic latent image on a photoconductor according to image data. The electrostatic latent image is visualized with toner to form a toner image on the photoconductor. The toner image is transferred onto a sheet and the sheet having the toner image is conveyed to a fixing unit in which heat and pressure are applied to the sheet to fix the toner image on the sheet.
The fixing unit includes a fixing roller for applying heat to the sheet having the toner image, a pressure roller for applying pressure to the sheet having the toner image, and a cleaning member for removing toner particles adhered to a surface of the fixing roller. The fixing roller and the pressure roller oppose to each other to form a nip between the fixing roller and the pressure roller, through which the sheet having the toner image is conveyed for a fixing operation.
During the fixing operation, toner particles of the toner image may be adhered to the surface of the fixing roller, and then may fall onto a surface of the pressure roller. The fallen toner particles may be adhered to a back side of a following sheet which is conveyed to the nip formed between the fixing roller and the pressure roller. To avoid this, the cleaning member contacts or slides on the surface of the fixing roller to remove the toner particles adhered to the surface of the fixing roller.
The background cleaning member is formed in a roller, blade, or web shape. The roller-shaped cleaning member rotates in accordance with rotation of the fixing roller during the fixing operation. Therefore, the roller-shaped cleaning member and the fixing roller may not easily wear, resulting in a long life of the roller-shaped cleaning member and the fixing roller, although the roller-shaped cleaning member may not provide increased cleaning performance.
The blade-shaped cleaning member slides on the surface of the fixing roller. Therefore, the blade-shaped cleaning member and the fixing roller may easily wear, resulting in a short life of the blade-shaped cleaning member and the fixing roller, although the blade-shaped cleaning member may provide increased cleaning performance.
The web-shaped cleaning member contacts the surface of the fixing roller, but may provide increased cleaning performance and a long life of the web-shaped cleaning member and the fixing roller. However, the web-shaped cleaning member may have a complex structure, resulting in a large size fixing unit.